Strip Sir Victor Blank of his title, say Lloyds shareholders

Furious Lloyds shareholders
have written to the secretive forfeiture
committee, which stripped
Fred Goodwin of his knighthood
on Tuesday, urging it to do the
same to former Lloyds chairman
Sir Victor Blank.

Blank pushed through the disastrous
takeover of ailing Halifax
Bank of Scotland in 2008 – under
pressure from then prime minister
Gordon Brown.

The takeover
brought the newly formed Lloyds
Banking Group to its knees and
led to it being bailed out by the
taxpayer to the tune of £21billion.

In the letter Jillian Timmis,
founder of the Lloyds Action Now
Association, said the takeover had
caused misery for 800,000 investors
as the bank’s share price
slumped up to 90 per cent.

A friend of Blank defended his
honour last night. He said: ‘During
his chairmanship of Lloyds he never
took a bonus, he did not take a payoff
and donated his last two months’
salary to charity. He was knighted
in 1999 for services to the financial
services industry and charities –
before he joined Lloyds.’

While the move threatens to reopen
old wounds, Lloyds yesterday
announced a management
reshuffle designed to get the ailing
bank back on its feet. Wholesale
banking chief Truett Tate, the last
of the old guard involved in the
HBOS takeover, will retire next
month.

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Chief executive António
Horta-Osório returned to work
last month after taking sick leave
for exhaustion. The restructuring
is designed to give the Portuguese
fewer sleepless nights with a
streamlined team of five departments
reporting directly to him.

Alison Brittain emerges as one of
the big winners. She will assume
the new role of group director of
retail, with responsibility for 30million
customers across Lloyds TSB,
Bank of Scotland and Halifax.

Another of Horta-Osório’s former
colleagues at Santander, Antonio
Lorenzo, will take charge of asset
finance, adding to his strategy and
wealth and international briefs.